[Commons-l] The disastrous popularity of Commons

[David Monniaux]

David Gerard a écrit :
> I don't, sadly :-) but it's also interesting for Commons press releases.
>
> Here's a somewhat-related question: I have ideas for press releases to
> drag the general public to Commons at a *fantastic* rate.
Please do tell.

As a person who answers the media as well as  people from various groups
in France (politicians, librarians etc.) I can say that very few people
have heard of Wikimedia projects outside Wikipedia. Wikisource and
Wikimedia Commons are unknown.

What's more, journalists are not interested when we tell them about
these projects, in general.

I see two possible reasons:
* There are "competitor" projects with massive  media power, such as the
French National Library's Europeana project (for Wikisource) or Flickr
(for Commons).

Of course, these "competitors" are different in that they provide unfree
content (the French National Library tries to claim copyright on things
that they should not, in my humble opinion). But, see, discussion of
"free" licenses goes waaaaay beyond what the public is supposed to be
able to handle, and probably what most journalists can understand. The
French public is used to the (contradictory) ideas  that if it's free 
in practice then it's  free (as in, if nobody is going to prosecute me,
it's ok), or that ultra-restrictive copyright is the way to go.

* Neither of these projects is as "scandalous" as Wikipedia is.
Journalists like scandal; they like Seigenthaler, Essjay etc. because it
provides fodder for discussion. At  least in France, they like to
question "intellectuals" who will speak ill of Wikipedia (or will not,
to their displeasure, as occurred during a radio debate to which I was
invited).